Ramón Fonseca, co-founder of the law firm at the center of the Panama Papers leak, died on Wednesday night, his lawyer confirmed, as he awaited the verdict in his money laundering trial in Panama.
Mr. Fonseca, 71, died following complications from pneumonia, his daughter, Raquel Fonseca, said to Spanish news agency EFE.
Both Mr. Fonseca and Jürgen Mossack, who together founded the company Mossack Fonseca, went on trial in Panama last month in connection with an explosive investigation published in 2016 by a coalition of media outlets that examined 11.5 million confidential documents of the company. The files, leaked by an anonymous source, identified international politicians, entrepreneurs, criminals and celebrities involved in networks of suspicious financial transactions that hid their wealth and avoided taxes.
During the trial, which began on April 8 and lasted 10 days, investigators alleged that the company had created shell companies with the aim of hiding money from illicit activities. A total of 29 people – former employees of the now-shuttered company and alleged co-conspirators – have been charged with money laundering.
Since the scandal began, Fonseca and Mossack have maintained their innocence. In an interview shortly after the Panama Papers were discovered, Fonseca said the company had carefully vetted its customers but that it was similar to a car factory that “is not responsible for what is done with the car” after which was sold.
Fonseca studied at the London School of Economics and later worked for several years at the United Nations in Geneva. He told the New York Times that he was “trying to save the world.”
In 1986, he and Mr. Mossack combined their small law firms into one that would focus on secretive offshore banking. He also became a famous novelist, twice winning a prestigious Panamanian literary prize and served as an advisor to President Juan Carlos Varela.
The Panama Papers investigation began with a message from an anonymous whistleblower to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, a German newspaper, asking if he was interested in the data. The newspaper decided to share the massive leak with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists in Washington, DC, which assembled a team of hundreds of journalists from more than 100 news organizations around the world.
The leaked files covered nearly 215,000 offshore entities and more than 14,000 banks, law firms and intermediaries working with Mossack Fonseca. Stories of the journalism partnership began to spread in April 2016, leading the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan to resign.
But in Panama some saw the company owners as victims. The country's bar association at the time came to his defense, saying the leak was an attempt to attack the country's reputation.
In 2017, Mossack and Fonseca were arrested in Panama on money laundering charges related to a scandal in Brazil known as Lava Jato, or Car Wash, a corruption scheme involving the state-controlled oil company Petrobras. They were released on bail from prison after several months. Their company, which at one point had more than 600 employees, closed in 2018, insisting it had not broken the law.
In the Panama Papers trial, the prosecution alleged that the company operated shell companies with the aim of moving black money from the German electronics company Siemens, linked to illegal payments. They also accused the company of being involved in illicit activities linked to Argentina.
It is unclear when the judge will issue his sentence. It is also expected to issue a decision on the trial that took place last summer in the Lava Jato case that also involved the company.
Mr. Fonseca had been hospitalized during the Panama Papers trial. His daughter told EFE that the scandal had caused his health to deteriorate.
“All this political persecution, all the injustices had a big impact on his physical health,” he said.
